Introduction:”Reservation in Higher Education and Jobs in Private Sector”…Yes or No? There has been lot of debate on this subject across the country. People are agitating…people are on hunger strike; Students have different views…professionals have different views. As per the interview with Cabinet Minister, (Human Resourse Development) Mr. Arjun Singh…on CNN-IBN, he is not willing to accept any facts and fingers. In short, after the interview he looks like a confused person…might be an effect of his age. Lets start from the very beginning, on the 27th of June 1961 Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru (First Prime Minister of India) wrote to the Chief Ministers: I dislike any kind of reservations. If we go in for any kind of reservations on communal and caste basis, we will swamp the bright and able people and remain second rate or third rate. The moment we encourage the second rate, we are lost. And then he adds pointedly: This way lies not only folly, but also disaster.Lets have a look at some other figures…”Learning from Past Experiences”…NSSO, which is a government appointed body, has actually in its research in 1999 – which is the most latest research shown – that 23.5 per cent of all university seats are already with the OBCs. And that is just 8.5 per cent less than what the NSSO believes is the OBC share of the population. So, for a difference of 8 per cent, would reservations be the right way of making up the difference? A study done by the IITs themselves shows that 50 per cent of the IIT seats for the SCs and STs remain vacant and for the remaining 50 per cent, 25 per cent are the candidates, who even after six years fail to get their degrees. So, clearly, in their case, reservations are not working. Parliamentary Committee on the welfare for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes says that “looking at the Delhi University, between 1995 and 2000, just half the seats for under-graduates at the Scheduled Castes level and just one-third of the seats for under-graduates at the Scheduled Tribes level were filled. All the others went empty, unfilled.”Sukhdev Thorat, the Chairman of the UGC. He points out that today, at higher education levels – that is all universities, IITs and IIMs – there is already a 1.2 lakh vacancy number. 40 per cent of these are in teaching staff, which the IIT faculty themselves point out that they have shortages of up to 30 per cent.Fifty years after the reservations were made, statistics show, according to The Hindustan Times, that overall in India, only 16 per cent of the places in higher education are occupied by SCs and STs. The quota is 22.5 per cent, which means that only two-thirds of the quota is occupied. One third is going waste, it is being denied to other people.In short, reservations mean that a lesser-qualified candidate gets preference over a more qualified candidate, solely because in this case, he or she happens to be an OBC. In other words, the upper castes are being penalized for being upper caste.Why Quota? Why Reservations? Will this help “underprivileged” communities to come at par with others? I don’t think so. If the foundation is not strong…one cannot make strong building on it. If you really want to bring everyone on same platform…strengthen the Primary Education; Improve the course material; provide teachers at that level and make people strong enough to compete with each other…provide the platform for institutes and corporates to choose the best.Mandal Commission…A regretful step…First Major Step towards reservation and quota system…beginning of caste based politics…1) The Mandal Commission was officially called Second backward Classes Commission.2) It derives its name from parliamentarian BP Mandal, who chaired the Commission.3) The Mandal Commission was constituted by the Morarji Desai government in 1978 to consider action politics for backward classes, aimed at redressing caste discrimination.4) The Commission Report was submitted in Dec 1980. It sought reservation for 27 per cent of all services and public sector undertakings under the central government and 27 per cent of all admissions to institutions of higher education for Other Backward Classes (OBCs).5) The percentage was over and above the existing 22.5 per cent reservation for SCs/STs.6) In Aug 1990, the then Prime Minister VP Singh assured its implementation in government jobs.7) It led to widespread protests, which finally led to his resignation.8) There were many self-immolations attempts, including that of Rajeev Goswami, a DU student.9) In 1993, the Supreme Court upheld 27 per cent reservation for OBCs.10) But it was subject to the exclusion of socially advanced persons/sections from amongst the OBCs.11) Children of Class I officers with income of Re one lakh were also excluded.12) The exclusion-income limit was revised to Rs 2.5 lakh in 2004.13) The reservation came into effect in Sept 1993 after the recommendations were accepted.14) In Aug 2005, the SC abolished all caste-based reservations in unaided private colleges.15) On Dec 2005, the Lok Sabha passed the 104th Constitution Amendment Act 2005, rolling back the SC judgement.16) The new clause allowed reservations for SC/ST and OBCs in private unaided educational institutions.17) The latest controversy erupted over the government’s proposal to introduce 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in central government-funded higher educational institutes like IITs and IIMs.Earlier Mandal Commission identified 11 indicators for providing reservation and quota is higher education. They were:SocialCastes/classes considered as socially backward by others.Castes/classes which mainly depend on manual labour for their livelihood.Castes/classes where the percentage of married women below 17 is 25% above the state average in rural areas and 10% in urban areas; and that of married men is 10% and 5% above the state average in rural and urban areas respectively.Castes/classes where participation of females in work is at least 25% above the state average.EducationalCastes/classes where the number of children in the age group of 5 to 15 years who never attended school is at least 25% above the state average.Castes/classes where the rate of student drop-out in the age group of 5-15 years is at least 25% above the state average.Castes/classes amongst whom the proportion of matriculates is at least 25% below the state averageEconomicCastes/classes where the average value of family assets is at least 25% below the state average.Castes/classes where the number of families living in kachcha houses is at least 25 % above the state average.Castes/classes where the source of drinking water is beyond half a kilometer for more than 50% of the households.Castes/classes where the number of the house-holds having taken a consumption loan is at least 25% above the state average.We have seen even during those years that “Reservation” is just not acceptable. Even if after Close to 60 yrs of Independence (we will be celebrating our Diamond jubilee year of Independence between 15th August 2006-15th August 2007), we are saying that we have not done anything to bring up the social status of people then we are just nullifying all the achievements. Had this been done 5 yrs or 10 yrs after the independence…it would have been acceptable but not after 55 yrs of independence.ConclusionNeed is to improve the standard of education at “Primary Level”, make people competent enough to fight in “Open Competition” and not to reserve the seats or provide any type of quota. The vociferous protest against reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and the growing unease about reservations for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes reflects the sharp conflicts which are erupting in Indian society over the distribution of a limited number of Government jobs and educational resources. It should be noted that the vocal opposition to the reservations for OBCs goes hand in hand with a more disguised resentment against reservation for the scheduled castes and tribes. One has only to recall to the Gujarat anti-reservation movement of 1981 and the recent December, 1989 U.P. agitation against the Parliament extending the reservation of seats in legislatures for the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes for another ten years.The movement against reservations in the present Indian context is definitely retrograde and objectively serves the interests of those who seek to preserve the dominance of the upper castes. The plea against reservations is advanced on the basis of equality of opportunity and merit. In an unequal society like India, where scheduled castes, tribes and shudras (the bulk of whom are the OBCs) have been discriminated against in choice of occupation, social mobility and control over the means of production, all talk of equality, without taking into account this reality, reduces equality to the concept of formal equality.As for merit, it is perfectly possible in India to discriminate in recruitment and promotions, on the basis of caste prejudices or preferences, militating against merit. Further, merit, as the Mandal Commission and a host of other commissions and Supreme Court judgments have pointed out, must be seen in the context of achieving real equality of opportunities, social environment and compensatory discrimination to ensure social justice.I sum up my feeling through the lines of following poem by Martin Niemöller (1892-1984) about accumulation of State power by the targeting of specific groups one at a time captures the slippery slope of the law very well:First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.Then they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist.Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Trade Unionist.Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me.Before I conclude, here are views of Mr. Sam Pitroda (Chairman, National Knowledge Commission), on reservation in Higher Education and Jobs:There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the quota system as long as it is applied judiciously and at the right levels. It cannot become a blanket solution for all time to come. It is my considered position to reject labels on the basis of anyone’s birth. It is an outdated, antiquated thinking to keep talking about caste based disadvantages. The first step for me is to reject all such labels in the 21st century and focus on equality for youth. In my case, hard work, good education and focus on technology helped me a great deal to overcome any disadvantages that I had because of what people still obsessively describe as caste.Technology gave me an equal footing for everything I have done in my life and career. I have said this before. Technology is a great leveler, second only to death. I have always negotiated challenges on the basis of my whatever little intrinsic merit quality and perseverance. I have never taken the route of quota or reservations. I hope this shows that it is possible.What we need is to create opportunities for everyone of equal merit to have proper access. On this subject there are many views and many sentiments. At times people look at this in terms of black and white while there are many shades of gray.Proper primary education is the key to building a sound foundation for higher education in the university. I wish we focus on this first. I also believe that every child must have opportunity for good education without worrying about caste or income levels. If the student is qualified we must find funding to support them in colleges. It is time to go beyond labels that stigmatize an entire group of people. I believe now in the early part of the 21st century we should make fundamental changes in the way we approach the concept of education, employment, equality and empowerment. But the point is it is time for a whole new approach in the 21st century. We cannot build the nation in the 21st century with the 19th century mindset.Looking forward to your comments and opinionReference:Newspapers: The Times of India;Hindustan TimesNews Channels: Star News; CNN-IBN
How to Use Stock Screeners?
There are thousands of options available in the United States stock market in which an investor can invest his money. There are more than twenty thousand publicly traded companies in the stock market in the US. Therefore, it becomes a very difficult task for any investor either a beginner or an experienced one to decide which company to invest in. It is impossible to know the names of all companies then how can it be possible to analyze all of them.So, the question arises, what do people use to decide where to invest and which companies to ignore? The answer is usually derived with something called a stock screener. A stock screener is nothing but a tool which is used by investors to short list the companies which are of their interest and where they can invest their hard earned money. Stock screening is a process of shortlist companies which have the potential to be in your portfolio. This screening is done based on the parameters provided by the investor himself.How the share screener works is very simple. Behind a screener is a huge database which has data about all the publicly traded companies. It contains even the historical data which goes past many years and decades. The investor would log on to the screener and give the parameters which interest him to shortlist the companies. The stock screeners act as search engines and bring out the list of companies which match the criteria provided by the investor. These criteria can be anything like minimum market capitalization, minimum revenue of the company, a particular sector, P/E ratio, profit margin etc.There are various stock screeners available in the market today. Most of them are online tools therefore, you just need a reliable and fast internet connection and you can download the stock screener to your computer. The screener makes use of the back end database and then provides the list of companies as per the criteria given as input.Some of the most popular screeners are available online on websites such as Yahoo Finance stock screener, MSN Money website and the Morning Star internet site. And the good part is that all these screeners are absolutely free of cost. There are basically two types of screeners – basic screener and customizable screener. For a beginner in stock market, the basic screener is sufficient while the customizable stock screener is often used by expert and experienced investors in the stock market.
The Great Paradox: Why Stocks Aren’t Getting Respect
Investors love to imagine their decisions are based on logic and foresight. But by using inconsistent arguments, investors have fooled themselves yet again, and created what I call the “Great Paradox.”For example, stocks have become the Rodney Dangerfield of investments: They can’t get no respect. Despite corporate earnings increasing 125 percent since 2009, many investors remain skeptical of the outlook for stocks. Bloomberg News reported recently that valuations for U.S. equities have been stuck in a remarkably long-running slump that hasn’t responded to this surge in profits, suggesting that investors don’t trust the growth to continue.That lack of trust is evident in the low Price-to-Earnings (P/E) ratio of the S&P 500, currently less than 13 times the 2012 earnings forecast. Compare that to the average historical P/E ratio of 16.4 times. If investors valued companies in the S&P 500 according to the historical average P/E, the S&P 500 would be 30 percent higher. But no such luck.Corporations proved their flexibility and adaptability during the Great Recession. Corporate profits have been very strong, rebounding much faster than GDP. Corporations now run leaner than they did a few years ago and will benefit greatly from any economic tailwind. Yet many remain skeptical that this profit resurgence will be sustained.On the other hand, bonds have performed extraordinarily well in recent years – so well, in fact, that many (myself included) see limited remaining upside. There’s not much of anywhere for long-term bond prices to go other than down, since those values run directly inverse to interest rates, which are currently nearly as low as they can be. Meanwhile, despite a worsening fiscal government outlook, U.S. Treasury bonds have done so well over the last 30 years that they have outperformed stocks. The last time that happened was prior to the Civil War.Still, investors have poured billions into bond mutual funds over the last five years, and have removed billions from stock mutual funds. According to data aggregated by TrimTabs, investors have removed money from U.S. stock mutual funds in each of the last five years, including approximately $100 billion last year alone. Meanwhile, investors have added money to bond mutual funds in each of the last six years, including more than $110 billion into bond mutual funds last year. Investors seem to think that bonds will continue to appreciate indefinitely; at the same time, they distrust that current corporate earnings will continue. They have fallen into the Great Paradox.Call me crazy, but I believe fundamentals matter. As Warren Buffett observed, “In the short term, the market is a popularity contest. In the long term, the market is a weighing machine.”There’s no reason to think stocks won’t perform well in a slow-growth economic environment and even better in a good environment. And unlike for bonds, being a strong performer isn’t an anomaly for stocks. For those with a sufficiently long-term perspective, clinging to bonds isn’t a position that makes sense. As Jeremy Siegel, finance professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in Philadelphia, told Bloomberg News, “The rally in bonds is a once in a millennium event, but it’s absolutely mathematically impossible for bonds to get any kind of returns like this going forward whereas stock returns can repeat themselves, and are likely to outperform. If you missed the rally in bonds, well, then that’s it.” (1)Why are so many people tempted to keep favoring bonds and avoiding stocks, ignoring solid reasons to do the reverse? One reason could be herd mentality. As my colleague Benjamin Sullivan observed, many investors follow the crowd, buying overvalued stocks when the financial media and Main Street are optimistic about the market, and shunning stocks when prices ebb, despite the fact that it makes more sense to buy low and sell high.Think about it. Should you buy stocks when everyone thinks the world is ending – say in March 2009, when the S&P 500 closed as low as 677 – or when everything is Pollyannaish – say in October 2007, when the S&P 500 closed as high as 1565?Though the timing is difficult to pinpoint, one should to try to buy near the height of pessimism and sell or reduce close to the height of optimism. As legendary investor Sir John Templeton once said, “Bull markets are born on pessimism, grow on skepticism, mature on optimism, and die on euphoria.”Investors may also be tempted to let past performance overly determine their expectations for future behavior. However, while it’s smart to glance in the rearview mirror from time to time, looking only backwards and ignoring the path ahead will inevitably lead to messy smash-ups.No one can forecast exactly what the market will do in the short term. But there’s no reason for the excessive pessimism that investors seem to apply only to stocks. This summer, Burton G. Malkiel, a professor of economics at Princeton, wrote in The Wall Street Journal: “We have abundant evidence that the average investor tends to put money into the market at or near the top and tends to sell out during periods of extreme decline or volatility. Over long periods of time, the U.S. equity market has provided generous average annual returns. But the average investor has earned substantially less than the market return, in part from bad timing decisions.” (2)Uncertainty is frightening, and it isn’t surprising that investors are tempted to cut and run at the first sign of trouble. Investors have clearly lost confidence in stocks in recent years. But post-recession, it seems many investors have gone a step farther than caution. I suppose two bear markets during the same decade are enough to make investors jumpy. Meanwhile, investors pile into a bond market with limited upside and considerable downside.Warren Buffet made the following analogy: “I’m going to buy hamburgers for the rest of my life. When hamburgers go down in price, we sing the ‘Hallelujah Chorus’ in the Buffett household. When hamburgers go up, we weep. For most people, it’s the same way with everything in life they will be buying – except stocks. When stocks go down, you can get more for your money, but people don’t like them any more. That sort of behavior is especially puzzling.” It’s not only puzzling; it’s costly.Hockey legend Wayne Gretzsky put it best when he said, “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.” The puck has spent the last five-, 10-, and 30-year periods making money for bond investors. I suspect the next five, 10, and 30 years are going to be in stocks’ end of the rink.Sources:1) Bloomberg, “Say What? In 30-Year Race, Bonds Beat Stocks”2) The Wall Street Journal, “Don’t Panic About the Stock Market ”